


Saving the Best For Last

by ilarual (Ilarual)



Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, Post-Dai Matou Enbu | Grand Magic Games Arc
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-06
Updated: 2016-11-24
Packaged: 2018-08-19 22:16:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8226484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilarual/pseuds/ilarual
Summary: Laxus has a thing for Mirajane, but has no idea how to get her attention. When he asks Lucy for help in catching the eye of the woman he's interested in, it seems like the perfect plan... but as they get to know each other better and their friendship deepens, new feelings spring up that suddenly cast his goal of dating Mirajane into doubt.





	1. Unrequited

**Author's Note:**

> Am I a terrible person for posting a new story when L&tDS hasn't updated in months and I still have unfinished Soul Eater fic on hiatus?
> 
> ...nah. This is a fic I've been referring to as "the trashy shoujo romcom fic," because it's cheesy and silly and shamelessly self-indulgent and hopefully funny, though we'll see how that goes. It's not really a slow burn fic, exactly (because having come straight from the SE fandom I consider taking anything less than two YEARS to get together not really a slow burn lol) but it's definitely going to be a slightly more drawn out friends-to-lovers thing, which it seems to me the LaxLu archives are sorely in need of.
> 
> My characterization of Laxus in this draws a lot on his spinoff manga, because it's the first time we've been allowed to get a lengthy look at Laxus during "down time." Most of what we see of him in the main series is when he's fighting, or standing at the back of the crowd trying to make himself unobtrusive, so I feel like Raigo Issen was a great look at Laxus when he's not in Ultra Badass Mode and actually just, y'know, kicking around being an actual person. He's tricky to write for precisely because we get so few insights into his day to day operation, but I think the spinoff has helped a lot in that (though I really wish more chapters had been translated... anybody know where I can find the raws of the remainder of the thing, incidentally?)
> 
> Thanks to my excellent friend scarlethousecarl for looking this nonsense over for me (and sorry that I made so many edits after she did because there's probably errors both of us have missed as a result). And with no further ado... let's get down to business!

Freed was a lifesaver.

That was the only thought Laxus could process as he watched his friend hussle a pack of disappointed women towards the refreshments table. Laxus had never been a big fan of being touched— by people he didn't know, anyway— and having women hanging all over him was a nightmare. Did wonders for his image, maybe, but dealing with people he knew and cared about was difficult enough. Trying to figure out how to respond to swoons and flirting from virtual strangers was his personal idea of hell, even without them hanging all over him.

But Freed, who was good with people, who had known him since he was eighteen and gangly and even more painfully awkward than he was now, was once again his savior. And while Freed was chivvying would-be coquettes off in some other direction, Bix and Ever took up positions on either side of him, chatting noisily and prepared to close ranks if anyone else tried to pester him.

When they called themselves his personal guard, this was what they meant. The idea of Laxus needing bodyguards for any _physical_ threat was laughable. The last time he'd been weak enough to need protection, he hadn't even hit puberty yet. He wasn't good with people, though. Didn't know how to make small talk, never could manage to be charming. Crowds stressed him the fuck out. But for years, Freed and Ever and Bixlow had been there to step in when he couldn't handle socializing, when he was tongue-tied and fumbling and offending everybody because he couldn't string a civil phrase together to save his life. They were the guardians of his sanity, more than anything, and he was never going to be able to repay all they did for him.

But there was only so much they could do, and when Elfman stole Ever away for a waltz just as Bix started to give a cluster of girls from Mermaid Heel the eye, he could feel his protection for the evening slipping away. He didn't really begrudge them the chance to cut loose— because seriously, what were the odds that any of them was ever going to attend a royal ball again?— but he felt a little bereft as they slowly drifted off. And without them, just the sight of one of those girls from earlier giving him a considering glance from across the hall was enough to have him bolting for the mezzanine.

Safely ensconced in the shadows of one of the balcony boxes overlooking the grand ballroom, Laxus leaned his shoulder up against one of the colossal marble pillars that flanked the curved balcony. He winced as the shift of his balance put pressure on his injuries; Jura had cracked two of his ribs, and Zirconis another three. He had declined Wendy's offer to heal them— the little girl and the Lamia Scale god slayer she'd befriended had worked themselves half to death over the last forty-eight hours or so, trying to patch up as many of the injured wizards as possible.

But he was a dragon slayer. He could recover in a matter of days from injuries that would leave most other mages bedridden for weeks or months, injuries that would _kill_ ordinary people. It was better for those kids to put their energy towards people who really needed it— he could handle some discomfort while he healed.

Swirling his glass of whiskey and cola and wishing that the royal bartender had had the decency to at least tap a keg, he surveyed the crowd on the ballroom floor below, looking for one familiar face in particular. But he couldn't seem to catch sight of her, and with so many people in the room, trying to catch even _her_ scent was a lost cause. He did spy his grandfather chatting it up with old Yajima, and Cana drinking with the dudes from Quatro Cerberus. He also spotted a few members of Twilight Ogre he vaguely recognized, who were wearing matching black armbands and somber expressions, and wondered if they'd lost somebody in the battle with the dragons.

These last few days had really been… _something_.

Laxus felt as though he wasn't totally settled in his own skin after everything that had gone down. Over and over, he found himself replaying that minute that hadn't happened. The terrified jolt in his gut when he saw Wendy freeze up, the way he reacted on instinct, Zirconis's scalding breath and the feeling of powerful jaws closing around his body…

He shook his head, annoyed at the shiver that ran down his spine. _Fucking dragon_ …

It was over, anyway. He didn't want to dwell on it anymore. Dragons and shitty, scheming, asshole dads aside, this had been one of the best weeks of his life. Being with everyone on the team, laughing and carrying on and sometimes being able to forget that he was the asshat who'd almost ruined their damn wonderful guild, standing shoulder to shoulder with his friends… it had been one hell of an experience. And kicking Jura's ass in front of the whole country had been a rush he wouldn't be forgetting anytime soon, either. And now to top it all off, here he was at a royal ball in Mercurius itself… and what was he doing? Avoiding the crowd and dwelling on what dying felt like.

Honestly, what was his problem? He really needed to get the fuck over it.

Laxus resumed his survey of the other guests, determined to get this shit out of his head. He spied King Toma still chasing Natsu around trying to get his clothes and crown back, and rolled his eyes. Some things just never seemed to change. What on earth was that idiot thinking, mugging the _king_ , of all people? He really couldn't understand how Natsu could be so wise one day and such a profound moron the next. He moved on, eyes still scanning the crowd, searching, searching...

And then, there she was. The contrasting flash of silvery-white hair against her scarlet gown made her unmistakable, once he finally caught sight of her.

_Mirajane._

Her sister held one of her hands and Cana the other, and the three of them were whirling together on the dance floor, turning giddy circles in the middle of the crowd, red and pink and purple skirts brushing against each other in a riot of color. Even from this distance, with the gift of his advanced senses, he could pick out her laughter amidst all the music and chatter, could see the way her eyes crinkled up at the corner as she beamed at everyone around her.

She was fascinating to watch.

For the life of him, Laxus couldn't say how his interest in Mira began. When had he stopped seeing her as a loudmouthed little annoyance who was all knees and elbows and never stopped pestering him? When did he start to see her as… well, a _woman_? He honest to god didn't know. He certainly only became _aware_ of it recently. Sometime around the start of the Games it had hit him like— if the shitty pun could be excused— a bolt from the blue.

There was just something about her, he really didn't know what it was. On a shallow level, he knew her beauty and power attracted him. But this feeling was something deeper, it had to be. Maybe it was her energy, her enthusiasm that drew him in. Or maybe it was that dichotomy of her nature, the way her sweet angel eyes hid the true demon underneath.

Whatever it was about her that had triggered this avalanche of feeling, it had completely taken hold of him over the course of the week. During the Games as her teammate, cheering their other friends on, watching her demolish that sickly-sweet pageant girl in their battle, he had felt it coming on strong, and he hadn't known what the hell to do. Mira really was the whole package, when it came right down to it. Kind and generous and gorgeous, with a body to die for and a ruthless streak he couldn't help but admire. She was amazing and it was making his head spin. And as the guilds of Fiore had licked their wounds these last couple days since the end of the battle with the dragons, it had only gotten worse.

It must have started before now. _Surely_ it had to have started sooner than this, because there was no way a feeling like this just came right the fuck out of nowhere. It must have been hiding somewhere in the back of his heart, and being around her so much this week had brought it out in him. It was the first time he'd really been in her company for more than a few minutes at a time since they were both teenagers, so it made sense that it would hit him like this once he was around her more.

But he supposed it didn't really matter how it had come about that he'd fallen for the She-Demon. What _did_ matter was what he was going to do now that he had.

Did he want to be with her?

Yes, obviously. Laxus's dating history was virtually nonexistent, but the allure of the inimitable Mirajane Strauss was irresistible. That wasn't even really a question worth asking.

But how to go about it?

He knew what Bixlow would say, if Laxus were foolish enough to actually bring it up. He'd give some distinctly off-color advice and waggle his tongue suggestively. And up until pretty recently, Laxus would've played along, with a crude laugh and a comment even more boorish than whatever Bix had come up with. He'd gotten very good at playing the role of the pervy alpha male— with teachers like Gildarts and his grandfather, learning the lines was unavoidable.

But, like so many of the other things in his life, it was all a balancing act. Performative. His constant hyperconsciousness of what other people thought of him biting him in the ass yet again. He was a guy, who looked a certain way, and he knew how guys like him were supposed to act, and he'd always played his part well. Said what was expected so that people could make their own assumptions and leave him alone. He had years of experience talking a big game and acting on pretty much none of it… and now that he actually _liked_ somebody, he wasn't quite sure what to do.

It was ridiculous. Fucking absurd, actually. He'd never been an indecisive person, never in his life, but now here he was having a minor crisis because some pretty thing had caught his eye.

Except… she was so much _more_ than just a "pretty thing." Modelling career or no, what made Mira special wasn't what she looked like; she was a complicated, quirky, vibrant person, and all he wanted to do was make the jump from friends to lovers. But he had no idea how on earth to pursue a woman he was actually serious about.

He sighed, tilting his head to rest against the pillar he was leaning on as his eyes followed Mira in her whirl around the dance floor.

Laxus wasn't the only one watching her, though. As Cana swung both Strauss sisters around with an overloud shriek of laughter from all three, he caught sight of a couple of guys from some other guild— Lamia Scale, he thought, though he wasn't sure— who were giving her long, appreciative looks. The one in the sparkly, lilac-colored pants in particular was looking at her like she was piece of meat sliced up especially for him.

He growled low in his throat, a distinctly draconian noise that he hadn't realized was a dragon slayer thing until he'd met Natsu, tuning his sensitive ears to try to pick up on what the pair were saying. If they were being nasty, a discrete, low-voltage reminder to keep their eyes to themselves might be in—

"Nah, man, that's Mirajane," the shorter of the two was saying with a shake of his head.

"Yeah, I _know_ ," his flamboyantly-dressed friend replied, in a tone like he was speaking to a complete moron. "That's why I wanna ask her out."

Laxus felt sparks run down his spine and he repressed the immediate urge to zap the presumptuous fucker six ways to kingdom come; he was pretty sure calling down the lightning in the middle of a crowded ballroom would not be considered appropriate for the venue.

"Seriously, I'm telling you, it's a bad idea, you're just gonna make an idiot of yourself," the first guy said firmly. "Mirajane Strauss hasn't dated anyone. _Ever_. She's, like, next level. She's got every guy in the kingdom throwing themselves at her feet, but she's never so much as gotten coffee with _anyone_."

Mira's would-be suitor cocked his head at his friend in puzzlement. "What're you getting at?"

"I'm _saying_ ," his friend said, with an air of nearly-exhausted patience, "that the girl's gotta have the highest standards of anybody you've ever met. You think she's gonna date you? _Please_."

"Wow, way to have confidence in me," Sparklepants protested, sounding highly offended. "Thought we were friends, jeez."

"Yeah, and as your friend, I'm trying to keep you from humiliating yourself."

Glitterbutt glowered. "Whatever, dude. Standards, schmandards. I'm gonna go ask her to dinner. Fortune favors the brave!" And so saying, he marched straight into the middle of the dancers and tapped Mira on the shoulder, forcing her to drop both Cana and Lisanna's hands and cease their dance in order to turn and acknowledge him.

Laxus didn't need dragon slayer hearing to know exactly what happened next, but he listened anyway. Mira, as expected, was sweeter than anybody wearing that many layers of sequins deserved in a rejection, but watching her turn Mr. Fancypants down was still pretty satisfying.

As he watched the gaudy loser traipse off the dance floor under a palpable cloud of misery, Laxus tried to maintain his smug grin… but the conversation he'd overheard kept intruding on his thoughts.

_She's never so much as gotten coffee with anyone..._

That was true. He'd known Mira since she was… how old was it when she came to the guild again? Twelve? Whatever, she'd barely hit puberty. He'd known her for half her life, and he was pretty damn certain she'd never dated anybody. Ever. At all. Much like himself.

_Unlike_ himself, he was pretty sure Mira's chronically-single status had nothing to do with being a reserved, romantically inept dumbass.

_That the girl's gotta have the highest standards of anybody you've ever met…_

Those words weighed on him. They'd been spoken by somebody who didn't know Mira at all, but they were probably also true. Clearly she didn't have any shortage of prospects. Dudes would line up around the block for the chance to so much as have her blow them a kiss. And that was just because she was _beautiful_. Guys who had any idea what she was actually like as a person would probably literally kill someone to get a date with her. Either that or they'd run screaming, but in Laxus's opinion, any guy with balls shouldn't be intimidated by a powerful woman. No, if she was single, it was very much because she had chosen to be, and he couldn't imagine that somebody like her actually preferred the single life.

And this was the girl he wanted to be with. What chance did he realistically have with her? What did he even think he could offer her? Power? Fuck, she wasn't as strong as him, but she was damn powerful in her own right. She didn't need a protector. Money? Sure, Mira wasn't going on S-Class jobs anymore like he was, but as far as he knew, modelling for Sorcerer's paid pretty damn well. She didn't need a sugar daddy. The thought of that was cringey anyway.

But _fuck_. That kind of thinking… that was all bullshit. Even if power or money _were_ the kinds of things that would attract a girl like Mirajane Strauss, he wasn't his father. He _wasn't_. He refused to be. Power wasn't what really mattered, and he _knew_ that…

But when it came to women, what the hell else did he have to offer? Not even just to Mira, specifically, but to women in general— what other selling points did he even have? Not a whole lot. He was attractive, and he was very aware of it. But even if his looks were able to get her attention, physical attraction wasn't enough to _keep_ her. His personality? His personality was a fucking joke. He wasn't exactly going to be winning Mira's heart with his wit and charm anytime soon.

Yeah, that was the crux of the issue. Laxus was extremely conscious of the fact that he wasn't exactly the life of any given party, to say the least. He was blunt and awkward and ineloquent and hopeless at small talk and kind of an asshole despite his best efforts. He really didn't mean to be, at least not anymore, but old habits were deeply-ingrained.

_Not_ , he thought, _that Mira had the most sparkling personality herself when she'd first come to Fairy Tail._ She'd been a catty, antisocial little thing herself, from what he remembered, so maybe he wasn't completely screwed. She might be able to overlook some of the glaring issues with his personality… but was that a chance he was willing to take?

Bixlow would tell him to go for it, probably. And while he usually trusted Bix's advice when it came to people— seeing as Bix was the most emotionally intelligent of their group— he didn't think the guy who'd been slapped three different times tonight by various women from other girls was really the guy he wanted to turn to for love advice.

Maybe he could ask Ever for her opinion? She knew about girls, seeing as she was one, so she would be able to give him advi—

Down below, a squabble broke out on the dance floor. Laxus's eyes were drawn down by the noise, and he discovered that the instigator was none other than the subject of his thoughts. Ever was standing still in the midst of the moving crowd, hands on her hips, glaring at Elfman so fiercely that it was probably lucky for everyone in the vicinity that her glasses were firmly settled on her face. From what Laxus could gather, she was taking Elfman to task for stepping on her gown and tearing the hem.

_Never mind_ , he immediately decided. Come to think of it, Ever was pretty much the only person he knew who was as romantically hopeless as he was. Taking love advice from a woman who couldn't even admit she had a boyfriend was not a smart move.

And with neither Bix nor Ever as viable options to go to for advice, that left…

"There you are."

Laxus glanced over his shoulder and saw a familiar face emerging from the shadows to join him on the balcony.

"Freed."

"You're hiding," Freed observed.

He shrugged. "Was gettin' a little stir-crazy down there."

"It's certainly a boisterous crowd," he agreed with an understanding nod.

Laxus grunted and set his drink down on the marble balustrade, crossing his arms and settling back against the pillar, inadvertently wincing again as his torso twisted uncomfortably.

"Are you in a lot of pain?" Freed asked. He never missed a damn thing, especially when it came to Laxus's wellbeing.

"'M fine."

Freed's look was skeptical. "I still say you should have Wendy take a look at those ribs," he said firmly.

Laxus shook his head. "Nah. I don't need her wasting her magic on me when I can heal just fine on my own. Kid's gonna be dead on her feet for a week with all the healing she's done as it is."

Freed gave him a thoughtful look. "You've really taken a liking to her, haven't you?"

"She's a good kid," he said, glancing down to where Wendy was dancing an unpracticed waltz with her little friend from Lamia Scale.

The knowing grin that touched Freed's lips when he looked back up was annoying. It was too similar to Ever's smug little " _I know you're secretly a big softie_ " smirk. As much as he loved that his friends knew him so well, they abused that power by taking every available opportunity to tease him. God only knew what they were going to do when they found out about Mira.

_Mira._..

He gave Freed a speculative look. Freed could be charming, in his own formal way. Polite. Socially adept. And he'd gotten close with Mira while Laxus was in exile.

"Hey, Freed."

"Yes?"

"If I… if _hypothetically_ a guy likes somebody, how's he supposed to go about telling 'em?"

He was reasonably sure he was blushing. Talking about this kind of thing was awkward, even with Freed, and now that it was out in the open, the question sounded disgustingly juvenile and he wanted it unsaid. But he'd committed himself to the subject, so he would see it through; he kept his gaze trained on the opposite wall, avoiding eye contact.

"That largely depends on the person," Freed said.

" _Helpful_."

"You ask a vague question, you get a vague answer."

Laxus took a break from glaring at the wall to glare at Freed instead. "Anybody ever tell you you're a pain in the ass?"

Freed grinned. "I believe I know a few people who may have mentioned it a time or two."

"Look, can you just answer the damn question?" It wasn't often that Laxus revealed his weaknesses like this. But because it was Freed, his oldest friend, and because this whole situation was stressing him the hell out, he found his guard slipping somewhat.

Freed seemed to realize he really wasn't in a mood to be teased, because his demeanor settled into something more serious, though there was still an amused glint in his eye. "Very well," he said. "Who is this hypothetical person?"

Laxus grimaced, uncertain how to respond, as he ran through his options. He could tell Freed, of course. Freed knew Mira pretty well, it seemed, so he might be able to give better advice if he knew who Laxus was interested in. But on the other hand, if he told Freed, and Mira ended up rejecting him, he knew Freed would feel obligated to side with Laxus. That would be a mess and a half by itself, and if Freed and Mira were at odds, Ever and Elfman would definitely get dragged into it, and god knew _that_ "discussion" would be neither quiet nor private, and then everybody else would know, lines would be drawn…

Good god, his love life could very well drive a deeper wedge into the guild than his idiotic "Battle of Fairy Tail" plan!

Deciding that nonspecific advice was a small price to pay for the sake of intra-guild unity, Laxus said, "It's hypothetical."

Freed raised an eyebrow but, as usual, let him have his way. That was one of the things Laxus liked about him. "Is this hypothetical person male or female?" he asked instead.

Laxus supposed he should have expected that question; his oldest friend was the only person he had ever confided in that he thought he might be bisexual. Still, to bring it up in public, where anybody could overhear—!

"It's a chick, obviously," Laxus snapped.

Freed shrugged. "Just asking. Though, isn't it a little ironic that you're asking me for guidance in wooing a woman?"

"Come to think of it…" The irony of asking a gay man for advice about women hadn't occurred to him until just now, but now that Freed pointed it out, it seemed ridiculous.

"Still," the rune mage mused, "a relationship is a relationship, regardless of the gender of those involved."

"Hey, Freed?"

"Yes?"

"Have you ever actually been in a relationship? At all?"

Freed looked distinctly flustered by this question. "Well… not as such."

Laxus snorted. "Fine pair we are."

"So it would appear."

"I think I'll pass on the advice, then," Laxus said. "No offense."

"Suit yourself."

They lapsed into silence, a comfortable companionship born of more than half a decade of familiarity. The ball whirled on, and together the two of them watched it pass by below. Laxus found it easier to enjoy from up here, amused by the antics of their friends and allies without having to participate. It wasn't that he disliked socializing, he reflected, but large crowds made him feel almost claustrophobic, and small talk was exhausting. Watching like this was better.

"We should go back down," Freed said eventually. "The others will start wondering where you've disappeared to."

"In a minute." He wasn't ready to give up his sanctuary just yet, though he knew he'd need to put in another appearance sooner or later.

"Take your time," Freed agreed mildly. He turned and headed for the door out to the hall, but paused just under the marble arch and looked back over his shoulder. "Whoever this woman is," he added, "she's lucky."

Laxus let out a sharp, quiet chuckle. "Sure."

"I'm serious," Freed said. "I can tell this is bothering you, so my advice is… be genuine. Talk to her, spend time with her, be open with yourself. Once she gets to know you— the _real_ you, not the face you show most people, but the Laxus we in the Thunder Legion have been privileged to know all these years— I don't think there's a woman on Earthland who could resist you." He paused. "Unless she's a lesbian. In which case you may be out of luck."

His snort at that was a little more genuine. "Sure. You're biased, but thanks."

Freed shrugged, but Laxus caught the grin on his face as he turned away again to sweep out the door and back downstairs.

Turning back to face the open room as soon as Freed was out of sight, he sighed. "Be genuine?" he mused. _That_ was terrifying advice. And what he'd said to Freed was true— Freed _was_ biased. There was no getting around the fact that Freed pretty much thought the sun shone out his ass, and somebody who didn't have the same history with him wasn't going to have the same perspective. Being genuine was only going to achieve showing Mirajane the fact that he was a blunt asshole who had completely failed to inherit any of his family's _supposedly_ hereditary charm.

Laxus closed his eyes, bracing his weight on his hands as he leaned against the balustrade. What the hell was he gonna do? Continuing in limbo like this was intolerable. He wasn't the kind of guy who did well with sitting around, stewing in his own emotions— one of many things he'd been learning about himself lately. The way he saw it, he had two options. Either he could decide to let it go, swallow his feelings, and content himself with being friends… or he could try to win her over.

Was he willing to accept friendship and only friendship from Mira? He didn't want to undervalue the bond they already had, because he'd been taking friends for granted for too many years, but he wasn't so sure it was enough for him anymore. Of course, they'd always been… well, he didn't think he could truly say they'd been _close_ , but even as a confused, bitter teenager, he'd tolerated her better than he had, say, Natsu. Even at her wildest, she'd always been good company. Her friendship was valuable. But was it enough?

He picked up the sound of a silver-bell laugh, and his gaze was drawn irresistibly to where Mira stood… but it wasn't even her laughter! It was Lisanna who had her head thrown back in a fit of giggles over something her sister had said. Dammit, he'd gotten so jumpy, he was hearing her everywhere!

Laxus sighed, head drooping tiredly as he leaned more heavily on the edge of the balcony. No, it was obvious he wasn't going to be content with friendship from Mira. But he'd be damned if he confessed like a nervous teenager! Not until he was absolutely sure he could get the answer he wanted. Laxus wasn't a gambling man, he didn't make uncalculated moves.

He needed an edge, he needed a game plan, he needed a way to make sure she would fall for him in return before he made his move. And Laxus was aware that, just like with his attempt to take over the guild, it wasn't something he could achieve alone. He needed someone to help him figure out how not to fuck this up.

But who? Bix and Ever were bad at serious relationships, Freed's advice was stupid and scary…

It was a strange thought, the idea that he couldn't rely on the Thunder Legion for help. He and Freed had known each other since they were eighteen and fifteen, respectively, and they'd met Evergreen and Bixlow not long afterwards. Though he knew he'd taken them for granted in his spiralling madness before his failed coup, the fact was that the four of them were closer than kin, and the idea that he'd come up against a problem they couldn't help him to solve was baffling.

So if he couldn't bank on help from his closest friends…

He dismissed his grandfather out of hand. They'd gotten better at actually talking to each other lately, but he absolutely was not about to spill his guts about something _this_ personal. Besides, the old man was far and away the biggest pervert Laxus knew— he'd probably get better advice from Bix.

He spent a longer moment contemplating the idea of asking Cana for help. He and Cana had been close as children despite the gap in their ages, and though by the time he was a teenager they'd drifted apart, they were starting to reconnect. And she certainly had plenty of experience with men _and_ women, so she'd probably give good advice… though again, now that he thought about it, Cana was more who he would go to if he just wanted to get Mirajane in bed. Laxus was moderately confident in his ability to do that much, at least, without help. Despite numerous rumors to the contrary, Laxus did not have a very active sex life, but he couldn't claim to be inexperienced, either. If all he wanted from Mira was sex, he was pretty sure seducing her wouldn't be too hard.

But a fling, a one night stand, friends with benefits… that wasn't what he wanted. He wanted something genuine, something honest, a relationship. He wanted a partner. Who did he know who could help him reach that goal?

And then, as his gaze swept again over the crowd below, the answer came to him. The perfect confidante, someone trustworthy, kind, reliable. Someone who, by all accounts, was great with people— she had to be, considering her team hadn't killed each other yet and she was the only cool head in the bunch— and who he knew Mira adored. Someone who, unlike some people (Cana) _wouldn't_ immediately turn around and spill the beans about his feelings to Mira for a laugh.

So the only question left was… was he willing to humble himself to ask Lucy Heartfilia, a girl he barely knew and had not been especially kind to in the past, for help?


	2. Unprecedented

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, so I meant to get this up over a week ago, but then the Chicago Cubs won the World Series which is a thing I've been waiting for since I was in diapers and then my country decided to elect Caligula 2.0: Now With Extra Bigotry, which understandably killed my will to finish the last couple scenes yesterday like I'd planned and basically what I'm trying to say is: I'm sorry this is late. Life got very surreal all of a sudden.
> 
> But speaking of impending apocalypses, I should mention that this fic takes place in a nice happy fluffy UA where Tartaros is not going to happen. Largely because I don't want to deal with an A-plot. This fic is about internal journeys. So without further ado...

The Fairy Tail guild hall had stood vacant for four years, ever since the guild had defaulted on the loans they'd taken out to rebuild after Phantom Lord demolished the original building. Nobody had been interested in buying it from the bank, so it had been unoccupied ever since, and it showed.

The people of Magnolia had obviously gone in and cleaned the place up in preparation for the guild's triumphant return from Crocus, but Laxus could smell the years of emptiness. Underneath the contrasting detergents and new furniture smells, the odor of dust and disuse lingered. It wasn't unpleasant exactly, but it put him on edge, and from the wince on Wendy's face when she had walked in the door with her team, he wasn't the only one who had noticed it.

He thought it might have bothered him more if it had been the old building smelling like that. The hall he'd practically grown up in. The hall his grandfather was born in. The hall, he'd just recently learned, that his great-grandfather and his friends had built with their own hands. The building Phantom Lord had blown to smithereens while he laughed and Mirajane cursed him with tears in her eyes after he…

Wow, he was an ass.

Laxus leaned back in his chair, a scowl unconsciously creeping across his face as he watched the guild carrying on in the usual way. His thoughts kept circling back to that… back to the way he'd been _before_. How little he deserved to be here was constantly on his mind, and he was torn between hating the feeling and knowing it was no more than he deserved after what he'd done.

Talking to Mavis had helped. For someone who looked like she was all of twelve years old, she was pretty damn wise, and he was glad he'd gotten to meet her. Hearing her stories about his great-grandfather had been… well, he was still processing that, how he felt about it, what Yuri Dreyar and his legacy really meant to him. But it had helped, in some weird undefinable way.

Still...

Mirajane swayed past his table, a tray full of drinks held high as she slipped between tightly-packed benches with a practiced swivel of her hips. Her hair was tied up, her fringe held out of her eyes with a jeweled clip, and as she passed, she turned and shot him a smile that made his gut clench.

"Anything I can get you, Laxus?" she asked sweetly.

"Uh…" His tongue felt paralyzed under her blue gaze.

She paused, tilting her head curiously. "Are you okay?" she asked.

Shit. Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit _say something you moron!_

"I'm… fine," he gritted out. "Just peachy."

 _Peachy?_ What the _hell?_ Since when was he the kind of guy who used the word ' _peachy?'_ Thank god neither Bixlow nor Evergreen was nearby, because if they'd witnessed this, he'd never hear the end of it.

Mira, to his infinite relief, didn't seem to see anything wrong with 'peachy,' because she smiled again.

"Okay. Well, let me know if you need anything," she said brightly. Then she turned and walked away, a wisp of black and silver gliding through the colorful crowd like a phantom.

After he managed to unglue his eyes from her retreating form, he sighed and forced his tense muscles to relax. This was getting _ridiculous_. Okay, sure, he wasn't really socially graceful on his best days, but tripping all over himself like this was embarrassing as hell and he needed it to stop. If he didn't take action soon, he was going to crawl out of his skin.

He looked around the room, trying to find Lucy. He spotted her sitting with her team and Shadow Gear, laughing at something the plant guy had said.

For the entire trip back from Crocus— three hellish days spent wallowing in the humiliation of being motion-sick in front of Mira, during which his only consolation was that Gajeel was enjoying the trip even less than he was— he'd debated with himself whether asking a near-stranger for help with his love life was actually a good idea.

That was his main argument against the idea, actually: the fact that he barely knew Lucy. He considered her a friend, he supposed. A member of the guild family. But he'd barely ever spoken to her— after the ass he'd made of himself over her during the Phantom Lord fiasco, he really didn't see how he had any business spending time with her. They'd exchanged greetings here and there, but that was about it. If he asked her for her help with Mira, he would essentially be placing his trust in someone he only knew by reputation.

But then… he did know her reputation in the guild. She was by all accounts sweet and kind and trustworthy. She was an heiress— _former_ heiress— but she didn't act all uppity, and everyone said she was basically an unending fountain of sunshine and positivity or something. It all sounded kinda dull to him, but admirable enough. And people loved her for it. Cana, especially, worshipped the ground she walked on, so he supposed she must have _something_ interesting about her. And with how everyone talked about her, he couldn't really think of anybody better to help him (well, maybe Lisanna, but owing _her_ a favor was taking your life into your own hands).

And so, while he had to admit to being skeptical still, by the time the B-Team's carriage rolled into Magnolia around noon, he had decided that he would just throw caution to the winds and approach her. Laxus tended to act quickly once his mind was made up, and now seemed like as good a time as any. The noise and chaos would probably afford them some privacy.

He watched her, waiting for the opportune moment, the chance to approach her without arousing suspicion. It took longer than he expected; Lucy was well-liked, and it showed. People kept coming up to talk to her, and it took what felt like forever for a window to open up. Laxus liked to think of himself as a patient man, but by the end of an hour, he was getting twitchy. Watching her interact so easily with their guildmates reinforced his impression that she was the best person to help him out of his quandary, but _seriously_ , how was it possible for a single person to be this in-demand? How was she not _exhausted_ by now?

"You've been staring at Lucy for the last hour," a voice hissed in his ear.

Laxus would maintain until the end of his days that he absolutely did _not_ jump.

"Spooked?" Cana asked slyly. "Thought nobody ever got the drop on _you_."

" _No_ ," Laxus growled at her, provoking a laugh as she plopped into a seat next to him.

"But seriously, what's with the rubbernecking?" she asked. "If you stared any harder, pretty sure Lucy's clothes would catch fire— not that anybody would be complaining if her shirt burned right off," she added with a saucy wink.

Laxus rolled his eyes. "You're a bigger perv than the old man, you know that?"

"So I've been told," she replied. "But you're not gonna distract me that easily— what's the deal with Lucy?"

He supposed he should have expected as much. Cana had known him too long to be put off or fooled by a misdirection.

"Just… tryin' to get to know people," he hedged.

"By… staring at them like a creeper from across the room?" she asked skeptically.

He shrugged.

"And since when have you ever wanted to get to know—" Her expression suddenly shifted, eyes widening warily. "Wait, you're not still interested in her, are you?"

Laxus winced. "Right. You were there for that." ' _That'_ being his ill-conceived attempt to blackmail the guild and score with the hottest woman he'd ever seen all in one go. Not his finest moment, and the fact that it had been Mira he'd been speaking to at the time made it all the worse in retrospect. And while he still considered Lucy the most attractive woman he'd ever met, he really wished he hadn't made a complete fool of himself and let the woman he'd subsequently fallen for know about it.

"No," he said firmly in response to Cana's question. "She's too young for me." Not necessarily true, but he wasn't interested anyway, and it would stop Cana from asking questions.

Most of the apprehension faded from her expression. "Good," she said. "I've got dibs on her, anyway."

"You call dibs on every hot chick that walks into this guild," he said. "Leave some for everybody else, will ya?"

Cana grinned. "Come on now, you're selling me short, Laxy. When's the last time you actually saw me with a date?"

Well, when she put it like that…

"Don't _ever_ call me 'Laxy' again, ya damn alcoholic."

She only laughed at that. "Really though, if you wanna be friends with Lucy— which, _excellent_ taste, by the way— you're never going to make it happen from all the way over here."

The devious grin on her face spelled nothing but trouble. Cana had a devilish streak in her (when she was sober, anyway) and he tried to head off whatever mischief she had in mind before it started. "I never said I wanted to be friends," he muttered. "Just tryin' to figure people out, alright? So whatever you're—"

"HEY LUCY!" Cana shouted to be heard across the hall, cupping her hands over her mouth. "Get that cute butt over here! Laxus wants to be friends!"

One more raised voice didn't draw much attention amidst the crash and chaos that was Fairy Tail in full celebratory swing, but Laxus kind of wanted to die anyway. Somehow, Cana was worse than Ever and Bixlow combined.

"I think I remember why we stopped hanging out," he grumbled, watching in complete mortification as Lucy looked in their direction.

"We stopped hanging out because you hit puberty and morphed into a giant talking penis," Cana said cheerily as she waved Lucy over.

Determinedly ignoring the mental image that conjured up, Laxus settled back in his seat, arms crossed, as he watched Lucy say something to Levy before getting to her feet. When she arrived at their table, it was Cana she addressed, much to his relief.

"Did you call me over here?" she asked.

Cana nodded and scooted over, patting the bench between herself and Laxus. "Sure did, Lucy. Why don't you have a seat here with the grown-ups, huh?"

"You're barely seven months older than me," Lucy said dryly.

"Age is just a number, darling," Cana said, putting on a haughty accent. Then she dissolved into giggles and patted the bench between them again. "We're old in our hearts, Lucy, that's what really counts. After all, Gray's older than I am, and you don't see me inviting him over, do you? You should be flattered."

Laxus glanced over immediately to where Gray was sitting, stripped down to his boxers and arm-wrestling Elfman for some reason. Dumbass. Even _he_ would be wary of challenging Elfman to a contest of raw upper body strength…

 _Yeah_ , he thought, _no matter how old they get, I'm always going to see those guys as kids._

Lucy, for her part, didn't even bother looking over at her teammate. "Are you already drunk?" she asked, looking less than amused with Cana's speech.

Cana shrugged. "Party's been going for three hours. I've had a few."

"If you think she's drunk right now, you got a lot to learn," Laxus offered. The way she was, he figured Cana was barely even tipsy. She'd had enough to make her giddy and loosen her tongue, but it would be a long time and several bottles of liquor— more if she switched to ale— before she got well and truly drunk. He worried about that, sometimes. But now wasn't one of them, she was fine for now.

Lucy rolled her eyes, but sat down as Cana had urged. Her thigh brushed lightly against his as she sat, and he reflexively pulled away an inch or two. She gave him a curious look, but her focus was on Cana.

"So why'd you really call me over here?" Lucy asked. "Did you say something about Laxus?"

Cana snorted. "Yeah. Mr. Grumpy-pants over here is trying to make friends by not talking to anyone and hiding in his corner, I figured we could do our part to make it look like he has a social life."

"Hey!" Laxus protested.

"Do you or do you not hide in a corner and sulk literally every time fun is happening?" Cana retorted, leaning past Lucy to give him an amused look. "Don't even try to deny it, buddy, I've known you since you were prepubescent."

"Yeah, and you were barely out of diapers so I doubt you remember much of that anyway," he said snidely.

Cana grinned. "If you say so."

Lucy laughed at them. "I didn't realize you two were so close."

"We weren't," Laxus said.

"I followed him everywhere for the first year after I came to Fairy Tail," Cana informed her, to his infinite chagrin.

"Yeah, you were annoying as shit," he replied.

Lucy clapped a hand over her mouth, unsuccessfully trying to stifle her giggles.

"Alright," Cana said, "if you're going to be pissy, then clearly you need a few drinks in ya. First round's on me, yeah? Lucy, what do you want?"

"Uhm… banana daiquiri?"

Cana nodded, getting to her feet, and glanced at Laxus. "Beer?"

He shrugged. "Whatever's fine. Nothin' with gin."

"Sure. Now you two behave yourselves while I'm gone," she said, pointing between the two of them before marching herself over to the bar.

Silence descended in her absence. Extremely awkward silence. Despite the raucous background noise of the guild in full party mode, complete with breaking glass, Laxus was extremely aware of the quiet that existed between him and Lucy. It was the kind of silence that occurred between two people who had nothing in common and nothing to say to each other… except that he actually _did_ have something to say to her.

He knew that now might just be the perfect opportunity to ask her for the favor he needed, but he had no idea how to bring it up. And Cana might be back any second.

He glanced over in the direction of the bar and immediately revised that opinion. He'd thought that Kinana was tending the bar with Mira bussing tables, the way they'd been working earlier, but it looked like the two women had traded off, because Mira was the one stirring up whatever fruity thing Lucy had asked for. And if Mira was at the bar, he figured it would be solidly twenty minutes before Cana got back with their drinks.

He looked down at Lucy. Once Cana had left and freed up bench space, she had scooted a little farther away from him, and she was fidgeting. Clearly she was as aware of the uncomfortable silence as he was.

Well, might as well make the most of the opportunity, right?

"Hey. Can I talk to you outside?" he asked abruptly.

Lucy looked up at him, making full eye contact for the first time since she arrived at their table. She looked entirely startled. "Huh?"

"I have something I need to talk to you about."

"But Cana will be back any minute," she said, still seeming very confused.

He snorted. "Nah. She's talking to Mira now. Once they get to gabbing it takes Cana half an hour to get anything else done," he said. "Your drink's gonna be melted before she remembers we exist."

Lucy looked over to where Cana was leaning over the bar, grinning at something Mira had said, and sighed. "You may be right about that."

He got to his feet and she followed suit. She seemed to think they were going out the front door, but like hell was Laxus having a conversation this personal standing out in the damn street.

He took long strides up the back stairs to the second floor, then the third floor, and then up to the roof door, with Lucy scurrying along behind him. Once they had emerged into the quiet of the summer sunset and the door swinging shut behind them had muffled the sounds of the guild below, he turned to face her.

"What's going on, Laxus?" she asked, looking at him with what seemed to be alarm. He supposed that was only to be expected. They'd never really had an interaction that lasted longer than thirty seconds, so suddenly pulling her aside for a private conversation was probably as weird for her as it was for him.

But that was all beside the point. Taking a deep breath, he said, "I need you to train me."

* * *

Lucy wondered if she was having a stroke.

"Come again?" she asked blankly.

"I said—"

"Yeah, I heard," Lucy interrupted. "I'm just having a hard time processing the idea that there's anything Laxus Dreyar, of all people, could learn from me."

"Don't be so sure," he muttered, glancing away. His tone was unexpectedly bitter.

Lucy frowned. "Being cryptic isn't going to help," she said. "What is it you need?"

He looked at her again, a long, intent look that made Lucy feel uncomfortably measured. She wondered if she was being found wanting. Determined not to be intimidated no matter how imposingly tall he might be, however, she held his gaze. As she watched, the cast of his eyes changed somehow, and he seemed to come to some sort of decision.

"Maybe 'training' isn't quite the right way to put it," he muttered, almost to himself. More loudly, he asked, "Lucy, if I tell you something, uh, private, will you keep it to yourself?"

Lucy had a very brief moment of indecision. She tried to be careful about the promises she made. Natsu had taught her that lesson very early in their acquaintance. And furthermore, this was Laxus, the man who had turned on his guildmates in a grab for power… but then again, he had also proved beyond doubt where his loyalties lay. She trusted him. She barely knew him, but that went for several of her guildmates, if she was honest. They weren't close, but she supposed she considered him a friend, of sorts.

Taking a deep breath, she said, "I'm a celestial mage, Laxus. My magic requires trustworthiness and honesty. I keep my promises, always. If you ask me to keep something confidential, I promise I will."

Laxus's eyes narrowed, considering her words. "Okay."

"So what is this big secret you're swearing me to?" she asked, now genuinely curious.

He glanced around, just a quick flicker of his eyes in the direction of the door and to the ground below, and Lucy realized that he _really_ didn't want to be overheard. Lowering his deep voice even further, he said, "There's… someone I like. And the thing is, I… uh… ah shit, this is embarrassing." He ran an agitated hand through his hair. "The thing is, I don't really know how to go about getting a girl to like me, and you seem like the kind of person who would know about that."

Lucy stared. If before she had thought she was stroking out, now she was very sure she must be hallucinating. Unless she was very mistaken, she thought Laxus Dreyar had just asked her to—

"I'm sorry, did you just… are you asking me for advice about your _love life?_ " she asked incredulously.

He rolled his shoulders in a very uncomfortable shrug. "Uh… yeah. Guess that about sums it up."

"I have a really hard time picturing you needing help with women," she said, because it was the first thing that popped into her head and she was too surprised to have much of a filter.

He scowled, and ran a hand through his hair again. "I… look, I'm not great with people," he said. "Never have been, but it didn't matter much 'cuz I had friends who stuck with me anyway. But now that I, uh, like somebody, I really don't know what to do, and everybody loves you so I figure you're my best bet for getting somebody to like me back."

Lucy pondered that for a few moments. She thought she should be flattered, in a weird way, but this was all too surreal to even process that. "What did you have in mind? I don't really understand how you think I can help you."

Laxus wouldn't meet her eyes, fixating instead on somewhere past her shoulder. "I don't really know, okay?" he said, voice low and rumbling and agitated. "I just know that I don't understand this shit and I need somebody who does to help me figure it out. Help me figure out what I need to do to get Mira to like me, that's all."

"Wait, wait, _Mira?_ " Lucy interjected, latching onto what was clearly the most important part of this statement. "As in Mirajane Strauss? _That's_ who you like?"

He shrugged. "Seems that way."

Resisting the urge to roll her eyes at his uncharacteristically non-committal answer, she mulled that over. Laxus… and _Mira?_ It was an unlikely match, in her opinion. Lucy could totally understand crushing on Mira— god knew she'd had a thing for Fairy Tail's very own covergirl at one time— but the idea of it being reciprocated seemed unlikely. Laxus just didn't seem like Mira's type. Not that she really knew what Mira's type was, but she just didn't think he was it. And even if the feelings were mutual, the idea of Laxus in a relationship…

But as she looked at him, she realized that was just it. Taking in the discomfort in his posture, the defensive stance he had taken with his arms crossed over his chest, she suddenly understood what he was getting at with his request. Just because he didn't seem like the relationship type didn't mean that he didn't want that kind of closeness. She knew firsthand that the face people showed the world and what they were really like, what they really _wanted_ , could be wildly different things.

"I think I get it," she said, speaking with great deliberation as this revelation washed over her. "You really don't know how to handle a relationship at all, do you?"

He finally made eye contact again, giving her a glower that would have curled a lesser woman's hair. "No, _obviously_ , or I wouldn't be talking to you, would I?"

"So… you want me to teach you how to be a relationship kind of guy, then?"

"If that's what it takes," he said, still scowling. Or maybe that was just his face.

She mulled it over, but really, what was there to consider? One of her guildmates, one of her friends, needed her help. How could she turn him down?

"I'm still not sure I'm the best person for the job, but… if you really want my help, I'll do my best."

* * *

It was late when Lucy left the newly-refurbished guild hall— well after midnight, in fact— but the party was still in full swing. Given the circumstances they'd been celebrating, several prominent townsfolk had been welcomed into the hall. Outsiders were almost never allowed in, but given that the citizens of Magnolia had spent the last week refurbishing the place, it seemed only fitting to welcome the mayor and city dignitaries, as well as Erza's favorite baker and a select handful of other notables. Needless to say, the civilians had petered out relatively early in the day, but Fairy Tail could go all night and rise with the sun for another round.

Lucy, therefore, was one of the first of the actual guild members to leave. There was too much on her mind for her to be able to relish in the crowd as she usually did. The events surrounding the Grand Magic Games had left her with a heavy weight on her heart, and it was making putting on a cheerful smile difficult. She needed sleep in the worst way.

And then there was Laxus...

She kicked at a loose pebble on the cobblestones as she pondered their conversation earlier. They had parted ways on the rooftop and gone back to the party after agreeing that, starting tomorrow, she would help him win Mira's heart. Not that she had any idea how on earth she was going to do that.

After two weeks full of twist after shocking twist, with the fate of Fiore in their hands, Lucy really hadn't thought that she was even capable of being surprised anymore. Into that frame of mind had tripped Laxus, and somehow it felt like the most astonishing twist of them all. The idea of _the_ Laxus Dreyar struggling with his feelings for someone astonished her.

From the first time she had seen him smirking down from on high, Laxus had seemed like an almost mythic figure. Granted, everyone in Fairy Tail had seemed like giants to her back then, but Laxus had retained some of that aura of untouchability in her mind long after she'd gotten comfortable with everyone else. So for a man she'd viewed as superhuman to approach her with a plea to help him land a date with a girl he was too shy to approach was, by virtue of sheer incongruity, absurd.

There were a lot of rumors about Laxus, a lot of stories that went around the guild about him being some kind of legendary ladies' man, and she'd always believed them because… well, it just seemed to fit. Good-looking, professionally successful, a former supreme asshole. It would only make sense for him to be a womanizer, too, right?

But the stiff-necked man who had floundered his way through petitioning for her help seemed at odds with that image. _Wildly_ so. Lucy found herself suddenly wondering how much of his reputation was based in fact, and how much was pure fiction. She knew firsthand that the magical community's rumor mill could churn out some pretty extreme exaggerations, so it wouldn't be _that_ much of a stretch.

Lisanna and Erza had both described Laxus to her, at different times, as being a very awkward man, but she'd never had the opportunity to observe it for herself until today. She hadn't disbelieved them, per se, but the picture of him they'd portrayed differed so wildly from her image of him that she had assumed they were exaggerating. After today, though, she really couldn't gainsay Lisanna's testimony anymore— she didn't think she'd ever seen a person look as profoundly uncomfortable as Laxus had during their little tete-a-tete.

It was nice, though, to see this side of him. To get a chance to see Laxus as a normal human man, with insecurities like everyone else, was something that she suspected was a pretty rare opportunity. And she had to admit, a small, devilish part of her found a great deal of amusement in the fact that Laxus Dreyar, of all people, had been brought to his knees by his inability to ask out a girl he liked. She wasn't sure where, but there was probably some enormous irony in that.

It was still a surprise that he sought her out, of all the people in the guild… but then, when she considered their other guildmates, maybe it wasn't quite _so_ surprising after all. God knew that, given the choice, _she_ certainly wouldn't go to Erza or Cana for love advice, to say nothing of the rest of them. She loved her guildmates dearly, every last one of them, but it had to be said that they were all a little… well… dysfunctional.

Lucy shook her head fondly, a rueful smile gracing her lips as she climbed the steps to her apartment door, pulling her house key from her skirt pocket as she went. For the most part, she found her friends' idiosyncrasies charming. Given the lives they'd lived, she could hardly blame them for having certain bad habits. It was only to be expected.

 _Though_ , she thought to herself as she unlocked the door, _I could stand to see less of Gray's privates. And I really wish that Natsu wouldn't_ —

Her train of thought ground to a halt as she stepped into her apartment and found the subject himself sprawled out on the floor next to her bed, an open bag of potato crisps and a circle of crumbs lying next to him.

"Yo, Lucy!" Natsu exclaimed through a mouthful, waving.

"Dammit Natsu!"

"What?" he asked indignantly, swallowing what he'd stuffed in his mouth. "What'd I do?"

"How many times do I have to tell you _not to just invite yourself in?_ " she demanded shrilly. "Can't I have _one_ night to myself before you start invading my privacy again?"

Natsu frowned. "But… I haven't been here since before we went to the S-Class exam," he said. "I didn't get to come over before we went to the spirit world. I've missed your place."

Her heart was still hammering from the shock of walking into what _should_ have been an unoccupied apartment only to find it very much occupied. Lucy took several breaths to try to calm herself down. "And why does that mean you have to break in?!" she exclaimed, voice still raised despite her best efforts.

He shrugged and took another handful of crisps, popping them in his mouth. "By the way, Lucy, you don't have any food in here at all," he said.

Lucy let out her breath slowly, willing herself not to kick him face-first through the window. She looked to her left and groaned internally. Every door in her kitchen was standing wide open, and two of her baking trays were lying on the floor. Clearly, Natsu had gone rummaging.

"Did you stop to think that maybe that's because we've been gone for over three and a half months?" she grumbled. "Unlike _some people_ , I don't leave things to rot in the lacrima cooler if I'm going to be gone for over a week!"

"Oh. That's smart!"

She rolled her eyes, but her ire was already fading. "Well, since you're here already, you might as well stay for a bit."

Natsu grinned. "Sure!"

"I don't have any food— obviously— but do you want some tea?"

"Sounds great, Luce!"

His smile grew wider, and that infectious grin of his made it so impossible to stay mad at him.

Lucy knew better than to ask what kind of tea he wanted; as far as Natsu was concerned, tea was tea, and it didn't matter whether it was darjeeling or pu ehr as long as it was hot. He seemed to enjoy holding the warm cup as much as he did actually drinking it, anyway.

She pulled down a box of tea bags, lamenting that she couldn't afford to buy loose tea anymore; the price had skyrocketed thanks to a border skirmish between Pergrande and Bellum that had disrupted trade routes two years ago. Her father, she had recently learned, had been working on establishing an alternate shipping line by sea rather than the expense of hauling through the mountains of Isenberg…

Her father…

She blinked hard against the stinging in her eyes and grabbed for the kettle. Her emotions had been so all over the place lately. Her mood could flip from joy to melancholy and back again so fast it gave her whiplash, and she couldn't seem to keep it together from one minute to the next. It was embarrassing. She didn't want to talk about it all… but at the same time, she _did_. She had no idea what was going on with her.

"Lucy?"

"Hm."

"What're you crying for?"

She turned on the water to fill the kettle, keeping her hands busy and her eyes turned away. "I'm not," she said, grateful that her voice didn't betray her.

"Then why d'you smell like tears all of a sudden?"

Lucy resisted the urge to give him an incredulous look over her shoulder. "It's so weird that you can do that," she muttered.

"No it's not," Natsu said. "You just can't smell for crap."

"Hey! My nose works just fine, thank you!"

"Nuh-uh, even Happy can smell better than you!" he protested, clearly pleased with this incontrovertible proof of his correctness.

Confident that her eyes were dry, Lucy turned to look at him as she slid the kettle onto the stovetop. "Happy is a _cat_ ," she said dryly. "Of course he can smell better than a regular human. Where is he, anyway?"

Natsu shrugged. "Still at the guild, probably. I think he was talking to Charla."

Lucy laughed. "That doesn't surprise me. But I'm surprised you didn't stay longer," she said.

"Eh. Juvia was all over Gray again," he said, his expression changing into something quite like a pout.

She tilted her head to the side, baffled. But this was Natsu, so who even knew why he did anything. Maybe even the most extroverted person she knew could get sick of people sometimes? "Oh. Well, that's not much different from normal," she said.

"Yeah," he said, crossing his arms with his shoulders slumped. He looked positively petulant, and Lucy couldn't fathom why.

"Well…" She cast around for a new subject because this one didn't seem to be going anywhere. So much had happened since the last time they sat here like this in her kitchen, five weeks or more than seven years ago, depending on how you counted it out. It seemed like everything had changed, and she suddenly wasn't sure what to say to the boy sitting there on the floor of her apartment. Her first human friend.

The kettle whistled and she turned away from him for a moment to turn the stove off and pour the boiling water into the mugs she had prepared. Then she crossed the room and handed one of the cups, which he immediately cradled close to his chest, his posture straightening up and his expression brightening.

"A lot's happened, hasn't it," she said thoughtfully, settling down across from him.

He nodded. "Yeah. Can't believe I didn't get to fight in the last day of the Games!"

She forced a smile at that, but the pensive mood that had crept over her wasn't alleviated by his response. "I really appreciate that you came with Mira to help me instead."

"'Course. I'll always save you, Lucy!"

She raised her cup to her lips quickly, warm porcelain pressed to her mouth to forestall the words she really wanted to say: " _I wish I didn't need saving."_

Once she'd scalded her tongue into silence, she said instead, "It feels like everything just changed overnight, doesn't it?"

Natsu tilted his head to one side curiously. "What d'you mean?"

"I mean… well, just _everything_." She waved a hand fruitlessly to try to illustrate her point. "With the Eclipse gate and the dragons and… and everything that happened with the Games, you know?"

His lip jutted out slightly as he pondered that. "Maybe. But we won, right?"

"Yeah. Yeah we did. But…"

"But what?"

She took a steadying breath, fingers gripping the handle of her mug tightly. "I can't stop thinking about what happened to that other Lucy. That other me."

It was amazing, watching his expression change. She could actually see the moment he shut down emotionally. His whole posture changed in the most subtle way, the lines of his body going rigid, and his eyes went hard as they sometimes did. Cold, like old charcoal.

"Natsu, I—"

" _Don't_ ," he said sharply, voice just as cold as his eyes. "Don't talk about it."

"But—"

"Lucy, I don't ever want to think about that again."

His tone left no room for argument. Lucy wasn't really surprised— she hadn't seen Natsu as distressed as he'd been that day since he had carried Erza out of the Tower of Heaven. It was obviously a painful subject for him. Everything had been too hectic for the last few days for them to really talk, but she had hoped that now that they were back in Magnolia and things had settled down that maybe they would be able to open up about what had happened in the palace that day.

Apparently not.

"Okay," she said. "I understand."

But she didn't. And that was the whole problem.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to everyone who has commented and left kudos, your support means a lot!


	3. Unsuccessful

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To my readers in the US, happy Thanksgiving! To my readers outside the US, happy Random Thursday!
> 
> This has been uploaded from mobile, so I'll spare you the long authors notes, but I will warn you, since it has been uploaded from mobile, there may be some formatting errors I failed to catch. I'll try to fix those if/when I catch them.

By the time Laxus arrived at the guild the next morning, Lucy was already there. He had the impression that she was a habitual early riser, and was generally one of the first people at the guild in the morning. This morning, her presence stood out especially, because the vast majority of their guildmates were still sleeping off their hangovers. In a hall that was totally empty except for her, Vijeeter in his usual corner, and Cana lying facedown on the bar, she was easy to spot.

She was sitting in a beam of sunlight streaming down from one of the second-floor windows, bent over a book. Her hair was partially tied back and she was— by her standards— conservatively dressed in jeans and a skin-tight tank top.

He considered crossing the room to join her. She'd said she would think about his "situation" overnight and try to decide how he should proceed, and he was eager to hear what she had to say. But was it weird to just go and sit with her? He wasn't exactly in the habit of seeking anybody's company, not even the Thunder Legion.

Then Lucy looked up and flashed a bright smile his way. She waved him over, and that settled the matter.

He crossed the room and slid into the bench opposite her, completely unacknowledged by anyone but her. Not that that was surprising, all things considered. She closed her book and slid it away as he joined her. He caught a glimpse of the title _: Divine Mysteries — A Brief Study of Celestial Spirits And Their Secret Histories._ Her choice of reading material said something about her, but he wasn't sure what.

"Hey," he said.

"Morning," she replied cheerily. "I didn't know if you'd be in today."

"Unlike some people, I actually know to stop drinking when I've had enough," he said dryly, cutting his eyes in the direction of a certain passed-out brunette. "I hate hangovers."

Lucy looked over at Cana as well and winced in sympathy. "She's wearing the same clothes as yesterday. I wonder if she slept here."

"Nah. Usually if she's too shitfaced, Mira takes her home."

She looked back at him, a knowing smile on her face. "When she's not being scary, Mira's really nice, isn't she?"

He nodded. That was part of what drew him in: her kindness. She didn't used to be a gentle person at all, but she'd learned to be, and he admired that.

"Aww," Lucy cooed. "You should see the look on your face! You really do like her, don't you?"

Laxus scowled. "You done with the chit-chat, or are we gonna be stuck making small talk for twenty minutes before we actually talk about anything important?"

Her bright expression lapsed into a sullen frown. "Right to the point, then?"

He was being rude and he knew it. It was an occupational hazard of being a Dreyar— he had the same shitty personality as his Gramps, without any of the charm to balance it out. But to his surprise, he actually found himself feeling bad about it. It was one thing to be a dick to Cana, who he'd known almost all his life, or to Ever and the guys, who were closer than blood. But Lucy was a different story. He'd been a dick to her way too much as it was in the past, and they weren't close enough that she would just get that he didn't mean his bluntness personally.

"Sorry," he muttered. "Not really good at beating around the bush about stuff."

Her expression cleared up immediately, much to his relief. "It's okay. I'm sure I'd be a little anxious in our shoes, too."

She was right, and it pissed him off a bit. He hated feeling so out of sorts and fretful. Eager for anything that could clear up the mess in his head, he asked, "So have you given any thought to…?" He made some kind of gesture that he hoped she would understand referred to things he didn't want to say aloud in the presence of others (even if, of the two people in the room, one was unconscious and the other was ignoring them).

"Yeah, I have."

"And?"

She shook her head, lips pulling down again in a frustrated little pout. "I'm stumped," she admitted. "The truth is, I don't actually know what, specifically, the problem is yet."

Laxus stared at her in complete disbelief. "What do you mean, 'what the problem is?' Didn't you hear me yesterday?"

"Yes, of course I did, but I just…" She dropped her cheek into her hand, bracing her elbow on the table as she eyed him thoughtfully. "I guess I don't understand why you don't just ask her out."

"Are you _insane_? I can't just do that out of the blue!"

"Why not? Lots of people do it," she argued.

"Yeah, well, lots of people don't have my track record of being an ass," he said.

Lucy's eyes narrowed. "Basically, you're scared of being turned down, then."

"'M not scared." He knew he sounded petulant and scowled down at the tabletop… because she was right. Apparently even he wasn't immune to fear of rejection.

"Sure, okay," she replied, in a tone that implied she didn't buy his denial any more than he did. "But whatever. The point is… I guess I just don't understand the situation well enough to know what needs to be done."

Laxus eyed her, annoyed and frustrated with her as much as with himself. "Well, can't you just… I dunno, give me general advice?"

She huffed out a sharp, incredulous little laugh. "Well, sure, I could tell you to buy her flowers or walk her home at night or talk to her about her interests, but if you wanted generic advice you could have picked up a self-help book or something. But you wanted someone to help _you_ , _specifically_ right?"

"Yeah, and look how great that's going," he grumbled.

Lucy gave him a deeply sour look, one he hadn't expected from someone who was supposed to be all sugar and sunshine. "I didn't say I couldn't help you," she said with over-exaggerated patience that was at odds with her glare. "I said I'm not sure how to _yet._ "

"What does that mean?"

"It means that I know Mira well enough, but I barely know you at all, and I don't have any idea what your current relationship is like. There are too many unknown variables. I can't predict how things are going to go without knowing how they are now."

Laxus considered that. When she put it that way, it made sense. He wouldn't be able to come up with a battle strategy if he didn't know who the hell he was fighting or what kind of terrain he'd be on.

"So, what? You want to watch me talk to Mira or something?" The idea of having his conversations observed and analyzed made him a little uncomfortable; it seemed like being put on display, somehow.

Lucy's eyebrows raised in surprise. "I hadn't thought of that, though it's not a bad idea. I was actually thinking we could just talk for a little bit so I can get to understand you a little better, but if you'd rather go about it that way…"

He shook his head firmly. "No, let's do it your way."

She grinned, perhaps a little smugly, and he wondered if his expression had betrayed his discomfort with the idea.

"Okay then," she said. "Tell me about yourself. Who is Laxus Dreyar, really?"

The question was oddly confounding. "What do you mean? What do you wanna know?"

She shrugged. "Well, all I really know about you is the basics, honestly. Name, age, magic type. Absurdly powerful. Probably a music lover since you carry your soundpods everywhere. Apparently you don't like gin? And aside from that, all I know about you is all the, um, sensitive personal issues that kinda got aired out in front of everyone. So I don't have a whole lot to go on here."

_Well, that's one way to put it,_ he thought, somewhat ruefully. He hated people knowing his business, but he'd brought it on himself so he didn't have room to complain now.

But what could he really tell Lucy about himself? For so long, his whole identity had been bound up in cultivating his strength- one of those "sensitive personal issues" she'd mentioned. Beyond that, even he wasn't totally sure who he was.

That was one of the things he'd realized during his exile. He'd spent a lot of time soul-searching as he'd traveled west, and come to the understanding that he didn't really know himself, or if there even was much to him besides power… and that had shaken him more than anything else that came out of his expulsion. He needed to be something, to be someone more than he had been, but right now he was still figuring out who.

But like hell was he telling Lucy that. It wasn't something he'd even talked to Bixlow about. So what to say?

"I got my first pair of soundpods because the guild was too loud," he said, because she'd brought up music and it was a neutral enough subject. "My hearing got really good really fast after I became a dragon slayer, and I couldn't take how loud everything was. Music was a good way to block out the white noise."

"How old were you?" Lucy asked.

"When I got the soundpods or when I became a dragon slayer?"

"Both."

The latter fringed on a little too personal, but he didn't doubt the old man had told the guild half the sob story of his fucked up childhood after he'd been kicked out, so whatever. "I was twelve when I got the lacrima implant. Well, a month or so shy of my twelfth birthday but whatever. As for the soundpods, I started saving up for 'em about a month later after I realized the way my senses had changed wasn't going away."

"So you bought them yourself? Those are really expensive," she remarked.

"I didn't wanna bug Gramps about it." _And by that age I'd already figured out that asking my old man for anything was a fast track to bruises._

Lucy looked at him thoughtfully, and he wondered what was going on in her head. Her scrutiny was uncomfortable, those wide eyes of hers a little too knowing. Or maybe he was just being paranoid.

Upstairs, he heard a door open.

* * *

There was a lot more behind Laxus's answers to her more of less innocuous questions, Lucy was sure of it. She wasn't sure why she felt that way, like he was keeping something back. He'd answered her questions easily enough.

But she had learned something interesting about him. She'd assumed that his isolation from the rest of the guild was mostly due to his awkward age- too young to fall in with Macao and his group, too old to really befriend the younger members- and his bad attitude. But the tidbit that his headphones had been a coping mechanism, even if he didn't call them that, was telling. She'd known for almost as long as she'd known Natsu that dragon slayer senses were pretty different from normal human senses, but none of the other dragon slayers she knew had ever seemed to have trouble with that. Laxus, apparently, had had a harder time adjusting. Was is because he hadn't been taught the magic by a real dragon? She was curious, and wondered if she was brave enough to ask.

Before she could, however, Laxus's attention had been noticeably diverted. He was staring over her shoulder, and Lucy glanced around to see Mira come wobbling down the stairs.

As usual, she looked beautiful and tidy, not a single hair out of place. Lucy had no idea how she pulled that off so consistently, but she wanted in on the secret. This morning, however, despite her well-kempt appearance, Mira had a frazzled, tired air about her. She seemed distracted, and there were dark circles under her eyes.

"Oh," she said vaguely. "Lucy, Laxus, you're here. Good morning."

"Morning, Mira," Lucy replied.

Mira nodded and wandered behind the bar for the coffee pot that was keeping warm over a lacrima coil. Both of the blond members of Fairy Tail watched thoughtfully as she poured two mugs. One she doctored with cream and sugar and slid across the bar top towards Cana, who was slowly starting to show signs of life, and the second she filled up to the brim. Mira brought the second mug to her mouth and downed most of the contents in a single long swig before reaching again for the pot.

"You okay, Mira?" Lucy asked warily.

Mira, looking only slightly livelier, turned back to look at her. "Oh, I'm fine," she said. "It's just that an awful lot of requests came in since we won the Games. Processing them is taking awhile."

Lucy knew an opportunity when she saw one. She couldn't do much to help Laxus yet, but she could buy him a little time alone with his crush, at least.

God, it was still so weird to think of Laxus having a crush…

"Sorry to hear that," she said, throwing a pointed look in his direction.

Laxus cocked his head curiously, but said nothing.

Mira shrugged, taking another long gulp of her coffee. "It's only to be expected. Fairy Tail made such a big splash, we'll probably be very popular for awhile."

Lucy gave her a sympathetic look and then, as Mira bent down to rummage under the bar, she gave Laxus an intense glare. " _Yes_ ," she said, "It's _such a shame_ you don't have anyone to _help you._ "

Laxus raised an eyebrow, and she hoped he was starting to catch on to what she was getting at.

"It's fine," Mira said, reappearing from behind the bar with a fresh light pen in her free hand. "Kinana deserves a break after everything she did for the last seven years."

"I guess you're right," Lucy said sweetly, still staring Laxus down as Mira poured a third cup of coffee. "But you shouldn't have to do it all yourself."

Either Laxus wasn't getting it or he was being stubborn. Whatever the case, Lucy kicked him under the table. Hard. He twitched and met her glare for glare, but it achieved the desired effect.

"Maybe I could help you out," he said with obvious reluctance.

Mira whirled around to face him, blue eyes shining with gratitude. "Would you really?"

Lucy smiled in satisfaction. Score one for Operation Cupid!

But her pleased grin slid right off her face when Laxus replied, "Sure. Me and Lucy aren't doin' much so we could both help." He gave her a pointed look of his own.

_Whatthe hell?_

For all her protestations that she could handle the work, Mira looked as though she might start crying in relief. "Thank you both so much! You're so sweet to offer, Laxus. Come upstairs, I'm all set up in the records room." She headed back up the stairs, and Laxus got to his feet to follow her.

Lucy jumped from her seat and caught up to Laxus as Mira disappeared to the second floor. "What the hell was _that_?" she hissed in an undertone, conscious of Vijeeter looking at them from across the room. "That was the perfect opportunity to be alone with her!"

"Yeah, when she's barely conscious and doing _paperwork_." The set of his mouth told her exactly what he thought of that.

She rolled her eyes. "Well at least this way you come still across as caring and dependable. It's something every girl likes."

Laxus raised a skeptical eyebrow as they reached the bottom of the stairs. " _Every_ girl? Doubt it."

Lucy wagged a finger at him, taking the stairs two at a time to keep up with him. "Ask Evergreen if you don't believe me— she's the one smitten with Elfman."

That seemed to stump him. He pondered it for a few seconds, but after a bit, he muttered, "Might be onto something there." He didn't look too pleased to have to concede the point, but Lucy considered it a personal victory that she had gotten that much.

They made their way down the hall toward the open door to the records room. "Well, you've roped me into this, might as well get it over with," she said. "After all, it's just paperwork. How bad can it—"

She stopped dead in the doorway, so suddenly that Laxus bumped into her. "...be," she finished, staring in horror at the sight before her.

Every single surface in the room was covered with stacks of fliers. The desks, the tops of every filing cabinet, even a good portion of the floor was stacked at least a foot deep in paper. Granted, it was a very small office, but _still._ Lucy felt her already tepid enthusiasm for the job sinking.

"Whoa," she said. "Mira, this is insane. How many of these have you already done?"

"Oh, the ones that are finished have already been filed and posted to the board," Mira said, looking up from the pile on the desk she was bending over.

Thinking of the job board— totally covered in fliers already by the time she arrived— Lucy asked, "Have you been working on this all night?"

"I guess I have," she said vaguely. "I only meant to get a couple jobs up for anyone who wanted to take one this morning, but there were so many that I just kept at it…"

Lucy frowned. Mira pushed herself hard, as did most members of the guild, but this just seemed… excessive. "So, uh, what can we do?" she asked, unsure how else to respond.

Mira held up a small device shaped a bit like a lint brush with a large, pear-cut lacrima crystal embedded in it. "First each request has to be scanned to make certain there are no hidden curses concealed within the flier itself. Just a precaution, of course," she added, seeing Lucy's expression. "It almost never happens, but it's better to be safe. Then after they've been scanned, each request has to be logged in the record book by date received, the name of the client, and a brief description of the job. Then they're sorted into piles based on class— the guidelines for determining how they should be classified are posted on the wall over there— and marked accordingly. Any that are time-sensitive are also flagged as urgent. Then they're ready to be pinned up on the job board."

"Wow," Lucy said, "you do this for every job request that comes in?"

"Well, usually there aren't nearly this many all at once," Mira replied. "It's just a rush right now because we were out of town for so two weeks and then with the Games…"

"So basically yes," Laxus said.

She hummed and took a sip of her coffee in lieu of a response.

Lucy and Laxus glanced at each other, and she was surprised to see that although he was scowling, his eyes betrayed worry. She liked him a little better because of it. "Leave it to the old man to push all the legwork off on somebody else," he muttered.

"I'm sure he has a lot of other work to do as guild master," Lucy murmured, to try and placate him. "Mira and Kinana are the only staff he's got to help him."

"Did you say my name?" Mira asked, looking up from the stack she was bent over.

"Oh, no!" Lucy said with a forced laugh and a wave of her hand. "How did you want us to start?"

Mira cupped her cheek thoughtfully, staring around cluttered office with sleepy eyes. "I'll keep scanning everything," she said. "You two can work on entering everything in the book and marking the fliers for posting. It would probably make sense to have Laxus write the entries, he's got such nice handwriting."

"Wait, really?" Lucy asked. She stared at Laxus.

She had grown up in a world where good penmanship was expected, demanded even, but the magical world valued different things. Most of the guild had barely legible handwriting— "chicken scratch" as Mrs. Spetto would say. And of all the people she would have expected to break that mould, Laxus was most definitely not on the short list.

Sensing her gaze, and presumably her astonishment, he said, "I studied runes a little as a teenager. Precision carried over."

"That makes sense." Considering one of his closest friends was Freed Justine, it was only logical, she supposed, that Laxus had experience with runes.

Turning back to Mira, she said, "I'll sit on the floor between the two desks and read the information from the requests off to Laxus so that he doesn't have to keep looking back and forth. If you'll hand them to me once you're done scanning, we can probably get it done more quickly."

"Like an assembly line!" Mira said, a spark of energy returning to her eyes as she brightened at Lucy's idea.

Lucy grinned. "Well, I am the granddaughter of the man who invented the concept," she said cheekily, settling down cross-legged on the floor while Laxus took the desk opposite Mira.

"Wait, seriously?" Laxus asked, opening the book Mira placed in front of him. "I thought the assembly line was invented by, uh… what's that merchant guy's name… something Wrigley?"

"Rigby," Lucy corrected. "George Rigby was my grandfather."

Not wanting to keep their attention on herself any longer, considering this whole thing was supposed to be an exercise in getting Laxus and Mirajane to spend time together, she decided to move things along. Maybe if things started going well, she would be able to find an excuse to leave, which had the double benefit of freeing her from paperwork and buying Laxus a few minutes alone with Mira.

"So, Mira, hit me with those requests," Lucy said.

With a nod and a yawn, Mira handed Lucy a stack of forty or so fliers. "These have all been scanned. I'll get working on the next stack."

Lucy nodded and picked up the first one. She caught Laxus's eye to make sure he was ready to go, then looked down at the flier. "Alright, so this job has been requested by the mayor of a village called Astilbe," she read. "Apparently the well in their town has been contaminated somehow and they need it purified."

"Purifying… poisoned… well…" Laxus muttered under his breath as he wrote, which was strangely endearing for some reason.

While he was scribbling, Lucy glanced up at the chart Mira had pointed out on the wall. Given the possibility that the contamination was magical, it was probably too risky to be listed as D-class, but she chewed her lip thoughtfully as she debated whether it was an especially high-effort C-class mission or an easier B-class. Deciding to mark it as C-class because Fairy Tail wizards were a cut above the rest, she set the flier aside and glanced over at Laxus to see her watching her expectantly, pen poised over the book.

She grabbed the next flier in the stack. "Okay, the next one is from a landowner in one of the northern provinces. He needs someone with a specialty in arboreal or other plant-based magic to help his gardeners resolve… an issue with _hedges? What?_ Does he not have anybody local to help with that kind of thing…?"

* * *

They made quick work of the first four stacks of fliers, and the three of them had really gotten into the rhythm of the job. Despite his earlier words, Laxus found himself wishing Lucy were gone so that he could have a little privacy with Mira. Not that it would really be quality time, but it had to be better than being stuck in a damn carriage with her. Even as it was, though, he and Lucy were still helping her out, and there was a certain amount of satisfaction to be had in watching the pile of processed requests grow while the number of unreviewed fliers shrank bit by bit.

As Lucy was setting aside the last of the fourth pile, however, he looked up to see that Mira had nodded off. Fairy Tail's secretary-cum-barmaid-cum-chef was fast asleep at her desk, hair falling in her face and the end of the lacrima probe resting against her nose. The stack of fliers she had been scanning were fanned out across the desk, clearly only half-processed.

Lucy glanced over at him, a sympathetic grimace on her face as she tilted her head in Mira's direction. "She's pushed herself too hard," she whispered.

"Chronic problem for people in this guild," he replied.

She rolled her eyes. "Like you have room to talk."

That was true enough, he supposed, though she didn't have to look so entertained by it! Deciding to leave the bothersome blonde to her amusement at his expense, he turned his eyes back to Mira.

"What should we do?" he asked. "Wake her?"

Lucy gave him an incredulous look. "No, idiot!" she hissed. "She's been awake for probably twenty-four straight hours as it is, she needs her rest."

Now that he thought about it, if she'd really worked through the night, she'd been awake for considerably more than twenty-four hours. Mirajane didn't suffer from motion sickness like dragon slayers did, but she didn't sleep well in a moving carriage, so she hadn't gotten very good rest on their trip back from Crocus.

"There's a futon set up in the next room over," Lucy pointed out. "Or at least, there was before we went to Tenrou, I don't know if it's still there."

He nodded and got to his feet. "Should be. From what I saw, most of the furniture upstairs wasn't moved around too much. I'll take her in there so we don't disturb her."

Laxus came around to the other side of the desk, but hesitated on the point of picking Mira up. What if she woke up? While he wouldn't object to Mira waking up in his arms, this wasn't really the context he had in mind. And it could get awkward if she didn't appreciate being carried…

Ah, fuck it.

As delicately as he could, he slid the chair out from beneath the desk and lifted Mira into his arms. She was a little lighter than he had expected, and she let out a soft sigh as he settled her securely against him. Her eyelids flickered a bit, but her heartbeat was steady in his ears and she didn't wake.

He ran into a bit of difficulty when confronted with the closed door; any jostling around to get a hand free ran the risk of waking her. Before he could come up with a solution, however, Lucy had slipped around him and pulled the door open. She preceded him out into the hall, glanced left, and flashed him a thumbs-up. "The other door is open," she whispered, standing aside so he could follow her into the hallway.

Passing Lucy by, he carried Mira into the next room over. It was one of those odd little spaces that didn't really have a designated purpose and so had been turned into a "quiet room" (read: crash pad for anybody too wasted to go home).

Laxus laid Mira down on the cot pushed up against the wall. She shifted a little and made a noise in her sleep and he froze, listening as her heartbeat picked up slightly. She stilled, and her eyelashes fluttered against her skin, silver against ivory.

She was so pale, he observed. Pale and deceptively fragile-looking in that same black dress she was wearing yesterday. He'd known that Mira had been at the guild all night long before Lucy had asked her about it. She still carried the odor of spilled beer on her skirt. And right now, worn down because she'd overworked herself, she seemed delicate and wan. But it was just a false weakness, and when she woke up she would be Mira again, ready to face the world with a smile.

He reached out a hand, meaning to brush his fingers across the skin of her cheek, but thought better of it, and withdrew.

When he returned to the records room, Lucy was standing over the desk he'd been sitting at, peering down at the mission ledger.

"You do have a nice hand," she remarked as he entered.

For some inexplicable reason, this observation embarrassed him. "Didja think Mira was lying?" he asked gruffly.

"No," she said, looking up again. "I just wouldn't have expected it from you, I guess."

He nudged her out of the way and sat back down at the desk, mentally berating the chair, which was definitely a torture device created by short people for the express purpose of sabotaging anyone over five and a half feet tall. "Yeah, well, sometimes people can surprise you," he muttered.

"Clearly," she said, her lips twitching up in amusement. "Sorry that quality time with Mira didn't work out. I kept trying to come up with an excuse to leave you guys alone for awhile, but I guess you were right before. It wouldn't have been much good even without me here."

Laxus supposed it was the thought that counted. "Is what it is. Guess we might as well keep working on this, then."

"Yeah. Having it finished— or, well, at least mostly finished," she corrected, looking around the filled room with distaste, "by the time she wakes up would be a nice surprise for her."

That sounded like a good idea. Lucy had had a point earlier. Stuff like this, being helpful, doing nice things for Mira… it was the exact opposite of anything his Gramps would do for a girl, which signalled to Laxus that it was probably a step in the right direction.

Lucy picked the abandoned lacrima probe off the other desk and started fiddling with it. "How do you work this thing, anyway?" she asked.

Distracted from his ongoing efforts of trying and failing to find any position he could sit in this damn chair that wasn't going to make him hate his life in three minutes flat, Laxus leaned forward. "Well, first of all, don't push that button if you don't wanna light every paper in the room on fire," he cautioned.

Lucy yelped and nearly dropped the thing in her haste to get her curious fingers away from the button in question. " _Seriously_?" she asked shrilly, looking at the object in her hands like it was a live serpent. "Why would a curse-detector need a fire setting?"

He kept his poker face stiff for all of ten seconds before breaking and letting out a chuckle. "Nah, I'm shittin' ya," he said, and his amusement doubled as her face turned all kinds of red.

"Wha— yo— did you—? _You asshole_!" she screeched, before clapping a hand over her mouth with a guilty glance at the open door.

Still chuckling, he shook his head. "You're pretty easy to mess with... _Cheerleader_."

Lucy's eyes went wide with horror. "Oh god, don't tell me Bixlow's got you started on that cosplay nonsense! He's bad enough, not you too!" she whimpered.

Entertained as all hell by her overreaction, he said, "Hey now, Bix's very impressed with you. He's told me all about how you kicked his ass while wearing a miniskirt at least five times now."

She rolled her eyes. "I bet he made it sound very kinky, seeing as how I tied him up in my whip and all."

While that was certainly a very intriguing idea, he decided to let her off the hook… for now, anyway. Although he couldn't quite kill his amusement, he tried to keep his face straight as he said, "Actually, he talked about how you exploited his weaknesses to put him down hard. It was a solid takedown."

"O-oh." She was red again, but for a very different reason. "Thanks. Loke did most of the work, though."

"Don't sell yourself short," he said.

He probably could have said more. Lucy beating Bixlow had, once he'd calmed down and had time to reflect on it, impressed the hell out of him. His team was, in essence, an elite hunting pack. All of them had worked hard over the years to get to the point they were at; together they were damn near impossible to beat, but while they had their weaknesses, none of them were exactly pushovers alone, either. And Bixlow, who was never truly alone, was damn near impossible for a solo mage to defeat, despite his glass jaw and general aversion to more exercise than was absolutely necessary.

But he didn't say any of that. He wasn't effusive by nature, and Lucy already seemed embarrassed as it was, so he let it be. He was pretty sure both of them would prefer to let the subject rest.

"So anyway," Lucy said, lifting the lacrima probe to eye level, clearly intent on dragging them back to the task at hand, "if it doesn't light things on fire, what does this button do, anyway?"

* * *

The time passed quickly as the two of them fell into the methodical rhythm of the task Lucy was pleased to discover that Laxus was easy to work with on a job like this, which was a relief. He wasn't easily distracted or inclined to slack off, and all he complained of was his hand cramping up after the first couple hours. Since that was easily solved by switching roles, it was a minor inconvenience at worst. They didn't talk much, aside from remarking on the occasional unlikely job, so while Lucy really didn't feel like she knew Laxus any better than she had when she woke up that morning. She did, however, feel much more comfortable dealing with him one on one.

It was, after all, very hard to be intimidated by a man who was struggling to fit himself into furniture that was obviously too small for him.

The desk and chair, she supposed, must have been purchased with Master Makarov in mind; Laxus was so much bigger than his grandfather that he practically made them look like doll furniture. But despite his clear discomfort, he didn't try to get out of the work, which in and of itself told her something about him.

They made good progress, and Lucy was pleased to see the pile of unprocessed fliers shrinking steadily. But some of the requests...

"God, who _are_ these people sending out for jobs like this, anyway?" she asked, after Laxus read off a request for a babysitter for a pair of twins. "Doesn't that seem like a job for a neighbor or family member, not a wizard?"

"Beats me," Laxus said. "People ask for all kinds of weird shit."

"Well, sure, I've taken some weird jobs, but don't you think-?"

"Oh goodness, are you two still at this?"

Mira's voice from the doorway made both of them look up. Her dress was wrinkled and her fringe had come untied and was hanging in her face, but she looked much better for having slept. The color had come back to her cheeks and her eyes were lively.

"Mira, you're awake!" Lucy exclaimed.

"I'm so sorry I fell asleep on you," Mira said, looking truly remorseful. "You didn't have to keep working on all these without me."

Laxus shook his head. "Wearing yourself out like that was stupid," he said gruffly.

As Mira's face fell into a frown, Lucy looked askance at him. Was that seriously how he was going to talk to the girl he was infatuated with? No wonder he needed help!

"We didn't mind helping out at all," she intervened. "We're nearly done, too. If you'll give us twenty minutes, I think we can-"

"Oh, no, you've done too much as it is," Mira said firmly. "I'll finish the rest. I _insist_."

And just like that, she was rushing them out of the room with a stack of fliers apiece and instructions to pin them up on the board, and slamming the door shut behind them.

"I think I pissed her off," Laxus said glumly.

" _You don't say_." Lucy rolled her eyes as they headed for the stairs with their armfuls of paper. "You were rude."

"Yeah."

"What was that about, anyway?"

He shook his head. "It was true, wasn't it? Running herself down for no good reason when the work wasn't urgent was pointless."

"Still, that's no reason to be mean about it," Lucy replied tartly. "Look, you want my advice? _Don't_ do stuff like that anymore. We'll figure the rest out from there."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the kudos! Your support means a great deal, and I'm glad to see you're enjoying the work.


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